Just a few questions regarding this, since I don’t know much about how public schools in America work.
1. How long do school hours typically last?
2. If a teacher was absent or is unexpectedly absent, how long does it typically last before they get a substitute?
3. Do some schools have eating areas located outside?
4. Are uniforms a thing in some public schools?
5. Do some public schools have rope climbing or rock climbing as an activity?
6. Can gym be in final period?
7. Can a gym coach be reported if they make the students do hard, grueling excersises without breaks and if she clearly enjoys taking pleasure in their pain and suffering?
Most of my American knowledge comes from sitcoms, and I have been told that some aren’t accurate to how things really are, so forgive me for my ignorance.
19 comments
1) 7-8ish hours, excluding any extracurricular activities
2) they have a lot of substitutes, or someone can fill in, it’s rarely a problem
3) some
4) some
5) some
6) sure
7) yes of course
1- 8am until 230 pm or so
2 – usually there is a sub when school starts that first day
3- most, I would say
4- yes
5- I am sure, but not common
6- yes
7- sure, that is more of a TV trope, though. Most gym coaches now are laid back
First things first: we have no national system. Schools are administered at the state-level and, more often, at the school district level (of which there are ~13,000). A student who goes to one district can have a very, very different experience and education from one who goes to the next district over. In some cases, it will even vary by school within each district.
That out of the way:
1. It was different every year for me. Varied from about 48 to 65 minutes.
2. It wasn’t rare for substitutes to not show up for an hour or two and for other teachers to check in on the class until they arrived. The class would basically just be a study hall (i.e. do homework, talk quietly, don’t be disruptive) in those cases. That was obviously only the case for short-notice subs
3. In warmer climates, yes. That’s common. In my high school in Michigan, once the doors closed in the morning, you were not allowed to exit them without permission until the final bell rang. Everyone ate lunch in the cafeteria.
4. Maybe? I’ve never seen a public district with them, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. That said, most schools will have rules on what’s allowed (e.g. skirt/short length, backpack rules, graphic depictions, etc.)
5. I have heard that some do and the rope climb is such a stereotype that I assume it _must_ be real somewhere, but I never saw either.
6. Yes. It can also be the first period.
7. Of course. Any teacher can be reported for anything. Doesn’t mean the school administrators are going to care or do anything. That said, in my experience gym teachers actually enjoyed doing it. Most of them taught other classes throughout the day and did 2-3 periods of gym and they liked the break as much as the kids. And, really, who wouldn’t enjoy watching kids pelt each other with dodgeballs?
Answers will vary, but I’ll try to give you answers from my time in public schools in NYC:
1. Roughly 8:30 – 3:30
2. If a teacher called in sick that morning, they’d have a sub ready for that day
3. If you mean the main eating area, then around here no–too cold for that in the winter–but we would get a chance to go outside for recess after
4. Only time I ever had a uniform was gym class
5. My schools didn’t
6. I don’t see why it couldn’t be
7. That seems very TV, though I guess it could happen if enough parents complained? Because of the number of students in gym class there’d be multiple gym teachers in the same period. Plus we only did exercising to warm up, we mostly played sports.
A lot of this depends on the state but I grew up in Virginia so this will be related to what I remember from there.
1. About 7 or 8 hours, essentially a full-time job. When I was in school(graduated high school in ’14), I want to say school was from 8-3. We also usually have about 6 or 7 periods of classes, plus lunch. So somewhere around an hour per class.
2. As kids we weren’t privy to that info but I’ve never had a situation where there was no sub when the teacher was out.
3. I’m sure some do(this is a big country) but it’s definitely not standard. Indoor cafeterias are the norm.
4. That’s mostly a high-end private school thing. Public schools have dress codes but they’re much more lax.
5. Yes. Rope climbing a common thing in public school PE classes and such. I’m sure rock climbing is more common in the mountainous regions of the country.
6. Sure. Not uncommon at all.
7. Absolutely, you can but tv stereotypes gym teachers as effectively drill sergeants but very few are like that.
1- Elementary was 9am-4pm. Middle school was 8:10am to 3:15 ish. High school was 7:20am to 2:29pm. Wednesdays were shorter than the rest of the week. Teachers will be around before and/or after school. So somewhere around 7 hours for students.
2- This doesn’t happen often but I think it happened to me before. We were waiting outside class for the teacher. After about 15 minutes or so we sent someone to the office to let them know. They sent a sub right away. So it’ll take as long as it takes the kids to say something.
3- I almost always ate outside. We had a courtyard where a lot of people ate, and we also had a cafeteria. The courtyard had some grass and ledges where people would sit, but also some benches and tables.
4- Uniforms were never a thing for me and I doubt any public schools have a uniform. Just a dress code that laid out certain things that aren’t allowed.
5- Some schools might, but that sounds like too much of a liability. It would probably just be something kids would do outside of school and not as part of school. My university had one, but climbing gyms are expensive and a public school would almost certainly not have one, for cost, liability, and probably a small percentage of students who would actually use it anyway.
6- I played soccer and you could have a class last period with your coach that counted as gym class. I think it was similar for other sports. Most of the gym teachers were coaches on sports teams so I don’t think having gym last period was available for most kids unless you participated in a sport. This probably changes depending on the school though.
7- That would definitely be enough to report them. I’m pretty sure my school required gym teachers to allow kids to just walk laps around the gym if they didn’t want to participate in whatever activity was going on. Forcing kids to do grueling exercises, especially with no breaks, would not be accepted.
1. High school ranges from 7:30-8:00 to 2:00-3:00. Middle school was more 8-3. elementary 830-9 to 3-4. This helps with busing and other transportation concerns, school districts can be pretty large areas.
2. Minutes? I don’t recall ever being in a classroom without a teacher for more than a few minutes. There’s a pool of substitutes and this was always handled easily by administration when I was a student.
3. Yes, especially those in nicer climates.
4. Yes, some. This is determined at the local level.
5. Yes. Different schools have different resources.
6. Sure.
7. This sounds like a plot device on a tv show or movie, but sure, a teacher can be a jerk. It’s not something that is normalized though, the gym teachers I had were always among our favorite teachers.
In general, school policy is decided by district, so there’s a lot of different formats.
I graduated in 2016 in Massachusetts, so I’ll answer these as best I can. It can vary in different parts of the country.
1. Our day started at 7:45 and was over at about 2:30.
2. 0 minutes. The district has substitute teachers on call for this purpose. In extreme cases they may have two classes join together until the substitute arrives.
3. Not here. It gets way too cold for that. Maybe in places where it’s warm all year.
4. No uniforms. There are dress codes which are essentially “don’t be overly revealing”.
5. One of our gym classes did take field trips to a local rock climbing gym. I never did it though.
6. Yeah, why not? I had gym in final period several times and then went straight into my sports practice.
7. Gym class being all hard exercises is a TV Trope. It maybe used to be true, but these days gym class is mostly focused on living a healthy lifestyle and having fun doing it.
School districts vary a lot. Schools are state run, and each district has their own rules and regulations.
1. My child is in school 7 hours a day.
2. There is usually a substitute immediately.
3. My child’s school has an indoor cafeteria and an outdoor area where they can eat.
4. Where I live all public schools wear uniforms. That is not the case everywhere. Some states and districts have dress codes, but no uniforms.
5. I’ve never seen that in a public school. Not saying it doesn’t exist, but I have never heard of rope or rock climbing in school.
6. Yes
7. Teachers can be reported for anything.
It can vary but Ill try to answer.
1. 7 or 8 hours
2. The school district likely has some they can send immediately.
3. Some do. At my HS they had outside picnic tables.
4. They can be or at least a stricter dress code that amounts to a uniform.
5. Some might but Ive never seen it in my experience
6. Yes unless there are schools that don’t have it at that time.
7. Probably but the sadist gym teacher is a popular stock character and isn’t as common in real life.
1. 6-7 hours (ETA: When I taught high school it was about 7am to 2pm-ish. Younger grades may be shorter?)
2. They have ‘substitute teachers’ assigned to each school district who fill in for whatever teacher is absent that day. Each teacher must maintain a set of lesson plans that the substitute teacher can deliver to the students while the main teacher is out. (At least in most schools.)
3. Yes. This is usually dependent on location and weather (e.g., California high schools are more likely to have this option than North Dakota high schools, but any school can have this area).
4. Most public schools, no. But public charter schools/magnet schools are different and many have uniforms.
5. Yes, but not all. Rope climbing used to be a pretty standard physical education (PE/gym class) activity, but not everywhere. Rock walls are probably only found in wealthier school districts. School district wealth varies WILDLY in the US.
6. Yes.
7. Most gym/PE teachers are not like this – it’s definitely a stupid TV trope. But it does often feel this way to the students when they’re made to do physical activity they don’t want to do. That said, yes, any teacher can be reported; the report has more weight if it comes from a parent (as they have more power). What is done about it if a teacher is reported for something egregious depends on the school district.
1: 7-8 hours a day. Start/ end times vary and length of breaks do as well.
2: typically the same day someone is tasked with sitting in the classroom. This could be doing nothing more than babysitting, or teaching the scheduled lesson. Long term absences get replaced with a real teacher fairly quickly
3: totally dependent on area. Where I grew up, no, because winter lasts 18 months there. Where I live now, the high school has picnic tables that seniors are allowed to use on their lunch break.
4: yup.
5: not that I have ever seen, but who knows.
6: it was when I was in high school. But only as a Junior and Senior.
7: Glee is not an accurate description of life in High School.
It varies by state, as others have noted. I attended a public high school in metro Detroit in the early/mid 1990s.
1. Our school day was 6.5 hours: 7:40 am–2:10 pm, with six 55-minute class periods and a 30-min lunch break.
2. A sub would be assigned by the start of the school day. Depending on their comfort level with the subject, they might attempt to teach the regular teacher’s lesson plan, or they might simply give us an impromptu study hall.
3. We had a courtyard where upperclassmen could eat; otherwise, we were required to eat in the cafeteria. Muslim students could spend their lunch break in the auditorium or library during Ramadan.
4. No uniforms except for sports and marching band. Choirs, symphony band, and orchestra wore concert black. For one of the choirs, we wore matching accessories (a scarf, maybe?).
5. We didn’t. I have no idea if other schools had/have climbing apparatus.
6. Yeah, all students were required to take 3 semesters of PE, so all of the available hours were filled.
7. I didn’t have any PE teachers like that. Even the ones who were sticklers for participation were generally fair about it.
1. About 6.5-7 hours
2. They get one immediately. As far as a more permanent replacement (but not permanent permanent), that would be on a case by case basis. This happened once when I was in school. The teacher had health problems and missed time frequently. I think we finally got someone new in like February/March.
3. Maybe. No school I ever went to did, but at one you could take your food outside and eat there.
4. Sometimes
5. I don’t know if any schools have rope climbing anymore. Rock climbing, maybe, but given all the gear and supervision required, it seems unlikely.
6. Yes.
7. I don’t know. Most coaches wouldn’t because they know they could get fired for that. In some cases, people might put up with it if it’s important. Some sports are like life and death to local communities.
>1. How long do school hours typically last?
Roughly 6.5 hours
>2. If a teacher was absent or is unexpectedly absent, how long does it typically last before they get a substitute?
Depends on how much notice there was. But I can’t recall any times when I had a sub who wasn’t there right when the school day started or pretty close to it.
>3. Do some schools have eating areas located outside?
It’s not common, especially not in northern, colder areas of the country, but it’s not unheard of.
>4. Are uniforms a thing in some public schools?
I’ve never seen a public school that had them. But every school district makes their own decisions about stuff like this so there’s probably a few that do.
>5. Do some public schools have rope climbing or rock climbing as an activity?
Rope climbing yeah. At least when I was in middle school in the 90s we had rope climbing. Never heard of rock climbing in school.
>6. Can gym be in final period?
Sure. Again, this is a decision each school and district make in terms of scheduling policies but I don’t see any reason why that wouldn’t be allowed. Also most schools don’t require you to have “gym class” anymore once you get to high school.
>7. Can a gym coach be reported if they make the students do hard, grueling excersises without breaks and if she clearly enjoys taking pleasure in their pain and suffering?
I’ve never heard of this happening. If a kid doesn’t want to or can’t participate in whatever is being done in gym class they can just sit out.
Sports team coaches might be a little more demanding in terms of exercises cause those are voluntary things that students sign up for and it’s more of a competitive thing as opposed to gym class that is usually required and has low minimum requirements. But yes if they were clearly being verbally abusive to the kid they’d probably get in trouble for doing what you’ve described.
1. my high school day was about seven hours total (including a half hour lunch)
2. under normal circumstances there would be a substitute *any* time a teacher was absent. unless it was a very sudden emergency, in that case I imagine they’d pull in another teacher who had a planning period or something. but I don’t think that ever happened when I was in school
3. probably, but you’re not going to find many of those where I live, or in most of the geographic us. I’m guessing they’d be most common in southern california
4. the vast majority of public schools do not have school uniforms. I’m sure there are some that do but it would be very rare
5. probably? my school had ropes on the ceiling but we never used them. rock climbing sounds like something for schools with more money
6. I don’t see why not
7. not even going to bother answering this one
From my time in school in GA
1. Elementary was roughly 8-2, middle was 8-3, high was 8-3ish.
2. Typically only one class period at most.
3. Yes.
4. Yes, maybe it’s a southern thing but I would say up to half of elementary schools have uniforms, not as common for middle or high.
5. I haven’t heard of either, I think that was more a thing like 50 years ago.
6. Yes, I had it final period several times.
7. That level of strict gym coach isn’t really a thing in public schools, usually they barely care if you show up. But yeah if it becomes enough of a problem they would be reported.
Some schools have longer days (8-3:30) but then their school year is shorter.